Paladin
This article is a description of the character class Paladin. For a description of the role of paladins within the lore of Warcraft, see Paladin (lore). For related articles, see Category:Paladins. Overview The Paladin is a tough melee class who supports his teammates through auras, blessings and healing. Though they aren't as powerful as a Warrior in melee or as efficient as a Priest or Druid in healing, they are arguably the strongest supportive class in the game. Paladins can use various auras to enhance their entire party and they have a strong selection of highly efficient buffs to aid others, in addition to their healing. Unlike Priests, Paladins can stand on their own in melee, supporting their allies from the front. Paladins also have several abilities (such as Exorcism, Holy Wrath and Turn Undead) which make them a powerful force when fighting Demon and Undead targets (not including Forsaken undead player characters). Many mistake the Paladin to be very similar to the Warrior, which isn't really the case. While a melee class, the Paladin has a poor Damage per Second (DPS) rate, perhaps even the poorest in the game. Many of their spells and abilities are supportive in nature, and a player who chooses a Paladin as "a Warrior that can heal himself" will often be disappointed. Races The Paladin is unique to the Alliance races until the release of the The Burning Crusade expansion'' : Alliance * Draenei (Draenei are not playable until the release of the 'The Burning Crusade' expansion) * Dwarves * Humans Horde * Blood Elves (Blood Elves are not playable until the release of the 'The Burning Crusade' expansion) [US] [EU (En)] May be called Blood Knights rather than Paladin for lore reasons. Weapons and Armor From the start, paladins can wear cloth, leather, or mail armor, and can train to wear plate armor at level 40. They may use a shield. They can summon their own Warhorse at level 40 (which they can obtain for free via a quest), which can be quested to an epic Charger at level 60. They can use the following melee weapons (either innately or through training): *swords, one- and two-handed *maces, one- and two-handed *axes, one- and two-handed *polearms (at level 20) *Fishing Poles Paladins cannot dual wield or use any conventional ranged weapons. For ranged damage, a paladin has several limited options: *taking the Engineering profession in order to obtain limited ranged capabilities such as dynamite, bombs, and trinkets. *:one notable option for a paladin who specializes in Gnomish Engineering is the Gnomish Death Ray, since a paladin's invulnerability shield prevents the player from taking the damage normally associated with using this item. (Note: Blizzard has mentioned that this will no longer work in past patch notes, although it has not been changed yet. Actually, they noted that while in blessing of protection if the trinket fails and backfires, you will still take damage, however you do not take damage while casting it, and nothing offical has been stated on this topic.) *a ranged trinket such as *non-engineering explosives such as EZ-Thro Dynamite or EZ-Thro Dynamite II *using Judgement in combination with a seal (see below) allows for a limited range attack similar to (but more limited than) a druid's moonfire. *spending talents in the Holy tree to acquire the spell Holy Shock You may be interested in a compendium of the best Paladin's weapons. ;See also: :Formula:Mana regen & Shields Auras In addition to spell buffs, a Paladin can also boost their group's abilities through the use of Auras. Multiple paladins can use different Auras within a group (although two Paladins using the same Aura gain no additional effect). The different Auras are as follows: * Devotion Aura: Gives additional 55/160/275/390/505/620/735 armor to nearby party members. (type: Protection; first acquired at level 1; 7 ranks) Armor bonus can be increased via talents * Retribution Aura: Causes 5/8/12/16/20 holy damage to any creature that strikes a party member. (type: Retribution; first acquired at level 16; 5 ranks) Holy damage can be increased via talents * Concentration Aura: Gives 35% chance of ignoring spell casting delays caused by damage to nearby party members. (type: Protection; first acquired at level 22; 1 rank) Chance of ignoring spell casting delays can be increased via talents * Sanctity Aura: Increases Holy damage done by party members within 30 yards by 10%. This is gained through a talent. (type: Retribution; Obtained at the Retribution Talent Tree; 1 rank) * Shadow Resistance Aura: Increases the group's shadow resistance to 30/45/60. (type: Protection; first acquired at level 28; 3 ranks) * Frost Resistance Aura: Increases the group's frost resistance to 30/45/60. (type: Protection; first acquired at level 32; 3 ranks) * Fire Resistance Aura: Increases the group's fire resistance to 30/45/60. (type: Protection; first acquired at level 36; 3 ranks) For more details, Auras are at the top of this Thottbot's Paladin skills chart. Blessings Blessings are spell buffs that can be used on the paladin or other characters. Most can be cast on any friendly but some are limited to the paladin's party. Blessings last 5 minutes unless noted. The different Blessings are as follows: * Blessing of Might increases melee attack power by 25/35/55/85/115/155/185 (type: Retribution; first acquired at level 4; 7 ranks, 7th rank acquired via a book in AQ20) attack power can be increased via talents * Blessing of Protection grants immunity to physical damage for 6/8/10 seconds (party member only) (type: Protection; first acquired at level 10; 3 ranks) cooldown can be reduced via talents * Blessing of Wisdom grants 10/15/20/25/30/33 mana each 5 seconds (type: Holy; first acquired at level 14; 6 ranks, 6th rank acquired via a book in AQ20) mana gain can be increased via talents * Blessing of Freedom grants immunity to movement imparing effects for 10 seconds and frees target from said effects (type: Protection; first acquired at level 18; 1 rank) cooldown can be decreased via talents * Blessing of Salvation grants a 30% reduction in threat generation (type: Protection; first acquired at level 26; 1 rank) * Blessing of Sanctuary reduces damage taken from all sources by 10/14/19/24 and inflicts 14/21/28/35 holy damage to the attacker if the attack is blocked (type: Protection; first acquired at level 21; 5 ranks) This is gained through a talent. * Blessing of Light increased heal made by Holy Light by 210/300/400 and Flash Heal by 60/85/115 (type: Holy; first acquired at level 40; 3 ranks) * Blessing of Sacrifice transfers 45/55 damage per hit taken to paladin for 30 seconds (party member only) (type: Protection; first acquired at level 46; 2 ranks) * Blessing of Kings grants +10% to all attributes (type: Protection; first acquired at level 20; 1 rank) This is gained through a talent. See Blessings at Thotbott for a complete list of available Blessings and their effects. Greater Blessings Introduced in patch 1.9, Greater Blessings are longer-lasting, easier to buff versions of normal blessings. Greater blessings last for 15 minutes and will buff members of the group of the same class as your target. Requires 1 Symbol of Kings per each blessing cast and requires the highest rank of corresponding normal blessing in order to be trained. Seals Seals are short-term self-buffs which boost the Paladin's power temporarily. Effectively, they add a weapon proc to their melee strikes. Additionally, Paladins can unleash these seals upon an enemy. Each type of seal will have a different effect when unleashed. The Seals provide the following buffs to the Paladin: See Thotbott for a list of Seal effects at each level. For PvP combat, be careful when fighting classes capable of dispelling 'magic' effects. These are most notably priests and shamans. A shaman purging you will remove two benificial magic effects (normally your current blessing and a seal). If you are inattentive, you can be caught without these on, and a much easier kill. Seal and Blessing Sequencing : Some of these sequences are talent independent (Mana and Health Conservation), while others are designed for Retribution-spec paladins. There are a few quality addons that can aid in sequencing, "Supercast" being one of them. * Mana Conservation - Once judged with Seal of Wisdom each hit to the judged target grants up to +59 mana to the attacker. In conjunction with Seal of Wisdom active on the paladin, he/she can generate +59+90 mana per hit. In addition, Blessing of Wisdom can generate +33/tick. With a fast 1h weapon a paladin can generate up to 149+149+33 ~= +333 mana per tick. And that does not take into consideration the Improved Blessing of Wisdom talent or mana regen gear (mana/5). The Concentration Aura helps to ensure you get that heal off in time. * Mana Conservation 2 - Or, alternatively, increase your weapon speed (and the amount of mana you get from your Judgement of Wisdom) by casting Seal of the Crusader. * Health Conservation - Once judged with Seal of Light, each hit to judged target grants +61 health to the attacker. In conjunction with Seal of Light active on the paladin, he/she can generate +61+94 health per hit to the paladin. Blessing of Light augments the paladin's healing spells. A paladin can generate 155 health per hit. The Concentration Aura helps to ensure you get that heal off in time. * 2H "Damage" Sequence - This sequence is truly for a Retribution-spec paladin, due to the use of Sanctity Aura and Seal of Command. While utilizing a damage sequence, it's important to pay attention to the current seal timer. One should judge the seal just before the timer expires to get full benefit of the seal and its judgement. The sequence below also takes into consideration the bonus to damage one gets if your target is stunned. * 1H "Damage" Sequence Seal of Command and weapon choice The way Seal of Command's damage is calculated can make some weapons more suitable for a Paladin than for other classes. To understand how this extra-damage stacks on top of simple (aka white) damage check the compendium of the best Paladin's weapons. Other Abilities Aside from Auras, blessings, and seals paladins have a few other spells that complete the class' arsenal. * Righteous Fury: Buffs the caster, increasing threat caused by holy damage by 60%. (First acquired at level 16; 1 rank; type: Protection) This spell can be increased via talent * Divine Protection/Divine Shield: The Paladin becomes immune to all attacks for a few seconds. (First acquired at level 6; 4 ranks; type: Protection. Name changes from protection to shield at level 34. Divine Shield allows you continue attacking while shielded at 50% attack speed.) * Divine Intervention: Sacrifices the Paladin to remove the selected friendly target from combat for 3 minutes. (first acquired at level 30; 1 ranks; type: Protection) * Lay On Hands: Sacrifices all of the Paladin's mana to heal your target of an amount equal to your maximum HP. Restores mana as well at higher ranks. (first acquired at level 10; 3 ranks; type: Holy) Cooldown can be reduced via talents or/and via a bonus when you wear 4 pieces of T3 * Hammer of Wrath: Tosses a hammer at target enemy, causing high damage. Only useable on targets lower than 20% HP. Works like an Execute for a Paladin, and usually seeing this being cast at you means you've lost the fight. If the target goes above 20% HP when this is being cast, the spell cancels. (first acquired at level 44; 3 ranks; type: Holy, physical) Paladin Tips #People will expect you to heal if you don't have a priest or druid in your party (see Healadin) #When buffing start by buffing yourself and then the rest of the party, that way you will know that when your blessing runs out it's time to buff everyone again. #In instances, give casters Blessing of Salvation, unless they explicitly request something else. It saves them from attracting aggro which could otherwise cause a wipe. #Flash of Light is mana efficient. Holy Light is time efficient (despite the 2.5 second cast). While Flash of Light may constitute the majority of your heals, consider using Holy Light in emergency situations like in PvP. #If there are two or more paladins in your group, decide on who will do what auras. #In larger raids, one paladin should be doing Blessing of Might/Blessing of Wisdom, another Blessing of Light/Blessing of Salvation, a third should cast Blessing of Kings on everyone. The fourth paladin should cover the rest of the Blessing of Light. As far as blessings goes, four paladins should suffice for 40 man raids. #Do not cast Blessing of Protection on tanks - even if it seems like they will die (unless some strategy requires it). It is generally ok to cast protection on a melee dps class, however, make sure to give them a different blessing (to erase the effect) once they are healed. It is almost always ok to cast Blessing of Protection on a caster. Talents Paladin Talents are split into 3 categories: * Holy * Protection * Retribution Talent builders can be found at: * Official Blizzard site * Panda Hideout * WoW Vault * ThottBot * Merciless Some good info at the official WoW forums: * A Paladin Talent Guide, Updated 3/14 End-Game Expectations As a Paladin your primary role will be to buff and decurse your party members. It is important to keep Righteous Fury up however and to lay on as much holy DPS as you can in case a tank dies. You will usually take the role of a healing class as well, however you won't be expected to wear a dress despite what folks might say or joke about. You are vital to a raid's success, and you also have Divine Intervention to back your raid up in case of a wipe. Expect to be playing the support role, and not going in with your hammers blazing on mobs, for the time being. This will change slightly after the expansion pack. The fundimental roles of paladins will shift more towards a defensive support class while our counterpart, the shaman, will shift towards a more offensive support class. Keep in mind that, in most cases, you are a hearty support class whose durability is the envy and frustration of others. With that in mind, here are some general rules of thumb with it comes to the various situations that you'll commonly find yourself in. HEALING IN INSTANCES Tanks ALWAYS get Blessing of Light. No exception. The paladin is a combat healer. We spam Flash of Light (FoL) like mad, raid/group wide, in an effort to keep our teammates alive. With that in mind, be intelligent about how you heal and what various levels of FoL one can use to get the job done. Example: A player near full health, who has suffered minimum damage, can either live without a heal or can be easily capped off by a rank 3 or 4 FoL (thus saving you mana). A player who has taken considerable damage (the MT/OT for example) should have max rank FoL cast on him. THIS TECHNIQUE WILL SAVE YOU MANA. And we all know that for any serious prolonged fight, you damn well need it. HEALING IN PVP The paladin's role as a combat buffer and healer is especially well-suited for battlegrounds. Your short duration buffs are ideal in these situations, as they cost very little mana and their short duration isn't really a big drawback on the battlegrounds (where you are sure to die or get dispelled within 5 minutes). Compared to the costly 30 minute buffs of other classes, the efficiency of the paladin blessings truly shines here. Your toughness makes you an ideal healer as well. Unlike priests, you will often not be the first priority for your opponents as you're too tough to take out quickly. This leaves you more freedom to heal. Our infamous "bubble" is what makes us so damn deadly in healing (yes...deadly healing). 12 seconds of totally uninterupted healing. Spam -max rank- FoL and keep your targets alive. For anyone nearing death, if you think you can spare the time, Divine Favor+HL will heal them near full unless they're a well equiped warrior/druid in bearform. SOLO HEALING When you find youself in solo combat, use your best judgement as to when to use FoL vs HL. Divine Favor while in the "bubble" and max rank HL is a common tactic. FoL a few times after a stun is also another common tactic, seeing as how you're in solo combat, mana conservation will be important. Gearing up for MC I'm seeing a lot of questions crop up recently about Molten Core and equipment requirements. Like say, how to balance Fire Resistance with other stats, and how much healing equipment is necessary, and so on. I'm hoping to lay a lot of those questions to rest in one location. I am not claiming that this is the only way go gear yourself, or the best way. But this method worked for me and countless other Paladins I know. You are certainly welcome to acquire a suit of leather and cloth +healing and mana regen items and there is nothing wrong with that, but I don't feel it's necessary for the early Molten Core encounters. I am also not covering strategy or interface modifications here. Much of that is at the discretion of individual guilds, and will determine what role you have to play. Fortunately by staying in plate you maintain your versatility to fill in if necessary. I. IN THE BEGINNING You're a Paladin who's been level 60 for a while, and your guild is starting to think about heading to Molten Core. You've done pretty much all the non-raid instances to their logical end point -- and even a handful of UBRS runs -- so you're reasonably well equipped by that standard. Let's assume you have the following items: Head: Lightforge Helm Neck: (anything) Shoulders: Lightforge Spaulders Cloak: Shroud of the Exile Chest: Lightforge Breastplate Wrist: Valor Bracers Hands: Gauntlets of Valor Belt: Lightforge Belt Legs: Lightforge Legplates Feet: Lightforge Boots Ring: Blood of the Martyr Ring: Ring of Demonic Guile Trinket: Blackhand's Breadth Trinket: (anything) Weapon: Bone Slicing Hatchet Shield: Draconian Deflector So you're sitting at around a minimum of 3750 HP, 3825 mana, 11 to healing, 6 mana per 5 seconds, and 70 Fire Resistance with your Aura up. To be honest you could probably walk into Molten Core and do acceptably well (as could most classes), but you really want to excel deeper in the zone. The first thing you're going to do is rehash your talents. To be honest with you, the most important thing you can do is pick up Spiritual Focus, Illumination, Divine Favor, and Healing Light. While this will require some investment in the Holy Tree, you are free to do whatever you like with the talent points, keeping in mind what your other guildmates have chosen for their talents. For example, if most of the guild is setup as retibution paladins, going into the defense tree in order to get blessing of kings or blessing of sancutary might be more useful. You are also going to want pick up the following items: 1. Drakefire Amulet - http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=16309 This is the key to Onyxia's Lair. If you've been level 60 for a while you probably already have this, but if you don't Allakhazam has a great walkthrough for this quest found here: http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/guides.html?guide=408 2. Royal Seal of Eldre'Thalas - http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=18472 Acquire the book "The Light and How to Swing it" from Dire Maul, or buy the book on the Auction House. Expect to spend about 150 gold on average. 3. Blazing Emblem - http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=2802 This is a random world drop, so you will likely be buying this as well. Expect to pay 200 gold on average. Okay, so you now have 3850 HP, 3825 mana, 33 to healing, 6 mana per 5 seconds, and 100 Fire Resistance with your Aura up. It's far from perfect, but you've probably spent relatively little time acquiring these items and your survivability against Firelords, Core Hounds, Magmadar, Gehennas, Baron Geddon, and the lava packs has jumped substantially. Go kill stuff. II. THE FIRST FEW WEEKS By now you should have killed Lucifron, and quite possibly also Magmadar. Chances are you picked up your first piece of Lawbringer armour, probably Boots. You've also had a few weeks to farm up some cash to acquire more items, not all of which you'll use right now: 1. Lesser Arcanum of Resilience - http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/quest.html?wquest=4483 You can get two of these, for a total of 40 FR. If you have to buy all the components on the Auction House, expect to pay up to 100 gold per Arcanum. As such, you may want to wait until you have a Lawbringer Helm and Legs to actually apply them. 2. Fire Resistance Enchant (cloak) - http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/spell.html?wspell=13657 One of these enchants will run you no more than 5 gold a pop for 7 FR. Definitely worth it on any cloak. Additionally, you should start working on the following quests: 1. Duke Hydraxis chain - http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/mob.html?wmob=13278 Complete all the quests this fellow has to offer, as the end reward is the excellent 15 FR Tidal Loop: http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=18398. You won't actually complete this quest until you are at Sulfuron in Molten Core. 2. Argent Dawn Reputation - http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/quest.html?wquest=5402 I suggest you farm your money in either of the two Plaguelands, and work on reputation while you're at it. Personally I preferred Gahhron's Withering, but it seems to be populated by gold farmers as of late. Revered Reputatin with the Argent Dawn will allow you access to the 5 FR Flame Mantle of the Dawn enchant: http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=18169 So by the end of the first few weeks in Molten Core, you should be sitting at around 3870 HP, 4022 mana, 51 to healing, 8 mana per 5 seconds, and 107 Fire Resistance with your Aura up (or 147 if you used the Arcanums). III. THE MIDPOINT A couple more Core runs and you'll probably have Gehennas dead, and you'll probably have another piece or two of Lawbringer; let's assume Legplates and Belt. Gehennas' death will quickly be followed by Garr and Baron Geddon, so you officially have a chance at getting all the Lawbringer pieces but the Chestplate. Once you've reached Baron Geddon, your guild probably stands a pretty good chance of killing Onyxia (if you haven't already). Getting her dead will ensure you have an Onyxia Scale Cloak within a few weeks which will add another 16 FR. Complete the Hydraxian Waterlord chain if you haven't already, and acquire the final quest "Hands of the Enemy." Keep farming Argent Dawn reputation, and feel free to buy yourself an epic mount as a treat because this is going to take a loooooong time. ;) There isn't really much more left to farm other than that. By this point you're going to be sitting at a healthy 3970 HP, 3970 mana, 91 to healing, 11 mana per 5 seconds, and 160 Fire Resistance with your Aura up. IV. THE END Fill out your Lawbringer suit. Sulfuron will be dead within an hour of you killing Shazzrah almost guaranteed, and Golemagg is just as easy. You'll have your Tidal Loop, you'll be done Argent Dawn reputation. Some other good items to watch out for are a Dragonslayer's Signet (acquired from the Onyxia's Head quest), and an Aurastone Hammer. You'll probably have an excess of money from the Argent Dawn farming, so gather the materials for some stellar enchants. Also, if you can pick up an Obsidian Edged Blade at some point, it's a very underrated and very powerful two handed weapon (especially since, once you reach a certain level of proficiency in the Core, you can melee and perform other support duties at the same time). Ideally, an ending suit will look like this: Head: Lawbringer Helm + Lesser Arcanum of Resilience Neck: Drakefire Amulet Shoulders: Lawbringer Spaulders + Flame Mantle of the Dawn Cloak: Onyxia Scale Cloak + Fire Resistance Chest: Lawbringer Chestguard + Major Health Wrist: Lawbringer Bracers + Healing Power Hands: Lawbringer Gauntlets Belt: Lawbringer Belt Legs: Lawbringer Legplates + Lesser Arcanum of Resilience Feet: Lawbringer Boots + Greater Stamina Ring: Dragonslayer's Signet Ring: Tidal Loop Trinket: Royal Seal of Eldre'Thalas Trinket: Blazing Emblem Weapon: Aurastone Hammer + Healing Power Shield: Draconian Deflector + Greater Stamina Your final stats (as a Human) will be 4471 HP, 4727 mana, 264 to healing, 18 mana per 5 seconds, and 237 Fire Resistance with your Aura up. That's enough to mitigate 60% of incoming fire damage, your Rank 8 Holy Light will do 2093 HP on average with Blessing of Light, and you can survive a full resist of a full damage Shadow Flame with raid buffs on. Quests Paladins have several class-specific quests which allow the character to learn valuable spells. See the Paladin Quests page for an outline of these quests. See Also *See Starting a Paladin for some advice when starting out. *See the Paladin Category for further information on the Paladin class. *Higher level Paladins will want to stop by on the following pages: ** Paladin Armor Sets **Paladin Armor Set Comparison *Statistics of paladins from Warcraft II *Also, some good info at the official WoW forums: ** Codex of Paladin Builds * Divine Magic ---- Category:Classes Category:Paladins Category:Alliance classes Category:Dwarves Category:Humans